Love How It Hurts
by SawManiac211
Summary: The Master stands to rule by cruelty and destruction, but sometimes - more often now - he likes to turn this destruction on himself. Rated M for self-harm.


**Recently I've become quite fond of writing angsty Master one-shots. I hate doing disclaimers, but unfortunately I DO NOT own John Simm or any other Doctor Who actor/character. Enjoy!**

_I've been losing my mind: I pretend that I'm fine, trying to keep it together while I crumble inside...It's the most beautiful pain in the world, I love how it hurts_

The Master has a definite fetish for knives. Aside from his laser screwdriver, it is his most used method of brutality; he often thinks that it is like a form of art: carving intricate shapes into the tender flesh of his victims. Mostly he aimed for Jack – immortal Jack, who could heal into an entirely new, blank canvas for him to work his magic on. Although sometimes – more often now – he likes to work on himself.

Selecting a particularly jagged blade, the Master inhaled deeply and made a light incision in his forearm, his breath shallowing as he moved it upwards. Humans used this as a pathetic way of either releasing pent-up emotion or to attract attention when they felt most invisible. How stupid. He snorted and the blade dug slightly deeper into his arm; he bit his lip to stop any sound escaping and glanced over at the room's only other occupant. The walnut shell of a man seemed to be sleeping, curled up in the foetal position on his side in the cage, but it was difficult to tell.

The Doctor. The Doctor would want to help him, to stop 'self-harming' and get a hold of himself. But he wouldn't understand, no, he'd NEVER understand. He didn't do this for any human reasons; he did it to distract himself from the drums in his head.

The sound became louder and he buried the knife in the soft underside of his upper arm, into one of the many old scars that criss-crossed way up past his shoulders and even reaching his chest, trying to immerse himself in his pain and scornful anger over what he hated most. Humans. HUMANS, with their silly little voices and silly little problems and silly little flaws, tripping blindly through life with no idea about where they were going or what they were meant to achieve other than getting to The End of their silly little existence. They tried too hard, giving either too much too soon or too little too late. But that wasn't what irritated him most. Their emotion, personality, even very SOULS gave off a specific mouth-watering or appalling scent that he could almost taste; they tried to hide it with smells – perfume, deodorant, incense, shower gel, bubble bath, the list went on – but they only added to the still detectable aroma and made even the best smells repulsive. Lucy, his weak little wife, tried to cover her already repugnant scent with a perfume so strong – and in such lavish amounts – that his eyes watered whenever he came within a metre of her. It did, he conceded, have the perfect name: Pure Poison, exactly the same as her personality. He didn't let on how badly he wanted to scrub the scent off her until she bled: the Master always had a reason, and this one in particular was to make sure he remembered how oh so very HUMAN and disposable she was, no matter what he showed on the outside.

He paused in his activities, idly watching his blood trickle down his arm and fingers and drip into a slowly growing puddle at his feet. What would HE smell like, he wondered. He'd tried it sometimes, snorting at his skin; he tried it now, and only came away with the familiar metallic tang of blood. He touched his tongue to an open wound, tasting the substance which kept him alive, which kept the sound of drums pulsing through him. Perhaps Time Lords could never smell themselves, he mused, never find out what _they_ were made of, only others. He could smell the Doctor, even so far across the room from him: earth and musk and wood smoke and something else, something that pleased him even to the point of arousal. Loss: it had cut through to the heart of the man's soul and remained there, as open as a wound.

But what of HIMSELF, the Master? He could take a guess: smoke obviously – not the pleasant smoke of the Doctor, already faded by the winds of time, but thick and choking like the clouds of it that had hung over the islands of Japan. Citrus; the acid of his malice and hatred eating everything in its path, and he laughed at its destruction. The metallic smell of his blood – which he had become fond of over time – but most likely it would be the blood of all the species he'd killed. And finally, spice; the fire of his eternal madness that burned within him, that blackened his insides and twisted and distorted his mind as the war drum beat on inside him...

As if on cue the drums struck up again, louder and faster and more insistent than ever before. He gritted his teeth to stop his howl of rage and – he didn't even want to acknowledge it, the shame of it – despair at it all: why, why couldn't they stop? Just for a few seconds, a few moments of peace? He hacked at his arm – both of his arms – in a savage frenzy, trying to gouge out the drums out of him. The best bet was of course to go for his head if he REALLY wanted to be rid of them, but the Master wasn't stupid. _That_ was pure madness even by his own standards, and anyway, with only the most minor wounds the scars would show and then everyone, EVERYONE would know what he did when he slipped away at night. He wasn't ashamed, of course not, but he knew that it would be taken as a weakness and signs of weakness could bring his dream crashing down before it became a reality. The Master knew Lucy suspected something was up: they no longer shared a bed, the feel of her, the warmth of her and her company no longer held their allure, but her eyes were like a snake's. They could pick out any and every miniscule detail, so when his movements became too exaggerated and his scars stretched tight against the tarpaulin of his skin, he knew she could see his brief wince of pain.

The blade slipped in his hand and he realised he was sweating, shaking as he moved his hand on autopilot. He knew he should stop but he carried on, silently gasping as the knife slashed and the pool of blood widened. He glanced down at the cuts and was nearly disappointed to see that he had not dug hard enough for it to be a problem. Before he knows it he is contemplating slicing through his main arteries and suck greedily at the blood flow as he bleeds out, high above the world he owns. Let it suffer, he won't anymore; Lucy could manage the snivelling humans, why should he care what happens next, Lucy could manage, she could –

No, _no_, NO! The Master replaced the knife hastily among its fellows on the tray and placed them with a rattle under a loose tile. He pulled down his shirt sleeves, relived to find that the drums had quietened to a dull murmur, almost soothing. His tongue darted out to moisten his lips. No, it wouldn't do _at all_ to top himself before the capture of Martha Jones, before his true vision became reality. Better by far to see it come true before embracing everlasting silence. No more drums...it was a pleasing thought.

He made to leave, to go to his room and either try to sleep or run through his plans one last time – and froze. The wizened little man in the cage, eyes grasping at its bars, stared right back at him. Its eyes – too big for its shrivelled head – took in the blood-splattered sleeves, the drying pool of the stuff at the feet of its wild-eyed enemy.

"Master..." The Doctor croaked.

"No," The Master strode across the room and knelt by the cage. "Don't say it."

"You don't need to do this."

"Oh, but I do. Y'see Doctor, knives are so many things that I want to be. They have variety, they are cold, they are cruel, they are sharp and THEY. FEEL. NOTHING." He yells the last words in the other man's face, the echoes cutting through the air like a shockwave. The Doctor looked at him solemnly and the Master felt like hitting him. How could he judge? Knives couldn't hear either: they could kill and maim with nothing to feel and nothing to forget...and they could not be destroyed. His greatest fear, his greatest flaw, was to be destroyed. He suddenly felt very tired. The drums loudened a tad and he marched back to the table, snatched up his jacket.

"Get some sleep," He snarled. "You're too old to be staying up this late!"

The Doctor doesn't fight; he simply curls up into a ball and that annoys the Master even more. He growls to himself and flicks a switch, turning on the sprinklers which would wash the blood away like it had never existed. No-one dared question why the floor was so wet in the mornings, and the Master was glad for that.

He walked along slowly and thoughtfully, hands tapping out the rhythm of the drums on the walls; not because he wanted to but because he felt he must, otherwise he would feel the urge for a knife so badly but too soon. He walked with the world at his feet, and yet it weighed heavily on his shoulders.

**Somehow this seemed better written on paper...**


End file.
